The European Environment Agency’s report attributed another 40 deaths to nitrogen dioxide pollution and 10 deaths to ozone pollution. The three figures should, however, not be added together to avoid double counting, a press release said.

“Premature deaths are deaths that occur before a person reaches an expected age,” the report stated. Life expectancy at birth in Luxembourg was 84.6 years for women and 80.1 years for men in 2018, from when the report data dates.

Across the EU-28--including the UK--exposure to fine particulate matter caused 379,000 premature deaths, with 54,000 deaths attributed to nitrogen dioxide and 19,400 to ozone pollution.

Six EU countries--Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Italy, Poland and Romania--exceeded the limit value for fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in 2018. But only four countries--Estonia, Finland, Iceland and Ireland--had fine particulate matter concentrations that were below the World Health Organization's (WHO) stricter guideline values.

The European Commission is working on revising EU standards under its zero-pollution action plan.